SCHOOL BOARD TO CONSIDER BOND ISSUE MONDAY NIGHT

The Cape Girardeau Board of Education will vote Monday on whether to put a $14 million bond issue and tax levy on the ballot for voters to decide in April.

The tax portion of the measure calls for increasing the district's property tax levy by 30 cents to help pay for the bonds.

The board also will vote on a separate ballot issue that would allow the district to waive its Proposition C rollback, increasing property taxes by an additional 39 cents.

The school board meeting begins at 6 p.m. in the Cape Girardeau Central Junior High cafeteria.

If voters approve both the bond issue and the Proposition C rollback, property taxes in the district would increase 69 cents, from the current $2.88 per $100 assessed valuation to $3.57.

The election would be held April 1.

The measures are vital under the district's long-range master plan, which the board adopted in November. The plan, which took a year to develop, calls for several construction projects and renovations through the year 2004.

The $14 million in bonds would fund the first phase of building projects. The bonds would be paid back over a 24 year period.

The plan's first phase calls for renovations of elementary schools, the junior high and the high school, plus construction of a new vocational school and elementary school. That phase would be completed in 1998.

The second phase of construction would require another $14 million bond issue. However, another tax levy would not be required.

Second-phase projects include construction of a new high school and finishing renovations to the junior high, which would become a fifth-sixth grade center, and the old high school, which would become a seventh-eighth grade center.

Under the district's master plan, May Greene, Washington and L.J. Schultz schools would eventually be closed.

When the bonds are paid off, the 30-cent portion of the increase would be eliminated. However, the 39-cent rollback would remain: The 39-cent portion would initially be used to help pay construction costs and related expenses. The money would then be diverted for educational programs and services.

District Superintendent Dan Tallent has said that in estimating the tax rate needed to pay back the bonds, the district conservatively calculated a 2.5 percent annual growth in assessed valuation. If property values grow faster, the bonds could be repaid quicker and the tax rate could be lowered.

Since 1991, three ballot issues proposed by the district have been rejected by voters.